Wednesday, January 19, 2011

I'm presenting two jams here, one of them a strict cover version by neo-pyschedelic rock-jam band Wooden Shjips of neo-electronic/dance-rock band LCD Soundsystem's upbeat single "Drunk Girls", and one of them a live version of neo-pscyh-synth-tronic rock band The Raveonette's song "Aly, Walk With Me" played by the band and members of the neo-psychedelic rock-pop band The Black Angels. So yeah, that's a lot of genre labeling and bending, but the truth of the matter is that I sincerely enjoy all 4 of these bands; specifically, The Black Angels put out one of my absolute fave LPs in 2010, I've been a Raveonettes fan for a while thanks to eMusic and a Wooden Shjips fan for a while thanks to random interwebz connectionz and an LCD Soundsystem fan-ish for a little while thanks to their last album (the rest? meh, I say). So yeah, I'm saying "So, yeah" again; also, I'm reiterating the fact that these are great bands.

This version of "Aly, Walk With Me" was performed at the Austin (Texas) Psych Fest in 2010. If there is a festival that I would love to attend, it's this one. Fuck Coachella and Pitchfork and Primavera and all that jazz; this shit is right up my alley. And here are two of my favorite bands performing, together, one of my favorite songs. Awesome. Here's the live "cover" version

and here's the original version.

(Bonus track! Here's an acoustic version by the band, posted by my friend Rumi on my Facebook wall tonight, and part of the inspiration for this post.)

And now, let's consider LCD Soundsystem and Wooden Shjips. The latter is an awesomely-psychedelic, guitar-heavy rock band, and I love 'em. And you know all about the former, and if not, just Google 'em. Here's the Wooden Shjips version

and here's the orginal. ("Embedding disabled by request", says YouTube. Says who? The band? YouTube? Google? Big Brother? WTF?)So certainly, the video of the LCD S version is better, as in, it exists, but don't let that detract from the WS version, which absolutely fucking rocks the ghee-tarr.

So there ya have it. Enjoy these jams. And for the future, please share your jams with me, covers or otherwise. I like 'em all.